Joss Whedon's Serenity 2.0

[Bcolon]

I can't wait for this movie! Other than episode III, it is my most anticipated movie of the year. That being said, I appreciate any info, scoops, pictures, or anything else that gets posted, so let's keep it nice and talk about the movie and not each other... can't we all just get along???

The video in the last thread of Whedon talking about Wonder Women was great! Thanks!

[Jay G.]

I just rewatched the Firefly pilot "Serenity" this weekend, showing it to a friend who hadn't seen it yet. He seemed to enjoy it. Man, if the movie "Serenity" is even just as good as the TV pilot "Serenity," it's going to be a great film.

[Jackskeleton]

Jewel and Morena laugh at this thread


anyone want buttons... I have a box full of them



The Wizard panel was really enjoyable



I think the main points of what was covered was really that regardless of what the focus groups where saying for the test screenings (they mainly didn't get it) Joss is going to stick to his guns and keep it so that long term fans will enjoy it without shutting out the new folks to the franchise.

He also mentioned something about sci fi showing the episodes.

[pilot]

previous (closed) thread on this is located at http://www.dvdtalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=385164

Barry, there's no need to post stuff from the previous thread.

[Barry Woodward]

Some additional pictures from the Serenity panel @ Wizard World:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...d-world-01.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...d-world-02.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...d-world-03.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...d-world-04.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...d-world-05.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...d-world-06.jpg

[reverie]

I'm happy to see a thread going again for this, I was disappointed the other one got shut down. As I've said before, there hasn't been a movie I've looked more forward to or have actively tried to get people into. Well, "try" may not be the best word. Everyone I've shown the TV series to has either liked or loved it, and through my lending, I've gotten four people to get the show themselves! Anyone else out there have any similar experiences? (I was going to make mention of recruiting browncoats, but didn't want to seem too far gone.. eh, I am, who am I kidding? )

I appreciate all the updates and pics! Even if I avoid some text in fear that there may be spoilers of any sort.

[Barry Woodward]

From IESB:

Joss gave his fans what they wanted. Lots of information on Buffy, Angel, a Spike movie, Serenity and all things in between. Oh yeah, he also talks about Wonder Woman.

Reading an article about this event won't do it justice. The chemistry that Joss and his cast have between one another and the appreciation that this cast has for it's fans cannot be "heard" through the written word.

So if you couldn't make it to Wizard World and you are feeling horribly guilty because you didn't go for whatever reason we have a special treat for you.

We have the entire 52 minute presentation on video for your enjoyment, of course minus the movie footage. We have broken up the video into 8 separate videos. They all range from 6 to 8 minutes apiece. You will need Windows Media Player. For those of you who are going to bitch and complain that, "real player or quick time is a much better format and why is this knucklehead using windows..blah, blah, blah." It's simple, more people have Windows Media Player than any other media player out there and I wasn't going to make two versions, sorry.

So strap yourself in, grab something to eat and hope to god that you have DSL or cable internet.

Source

http://www.iesb.net/video/serenitypanel1.wmv
http://www.iesb.net/video/serenitypanel2.wmv
http://www.iesb.net/video/serenitypanel3.wmv
http://www.iesb.net/video/serenitypanel4.wmv
http://www.iesb.net/video/serenitypanel5.wmv
http://www.iesb.net/video/serenitypanel6.wmv
http://www.iesb.net/video/serenitypanel7.wmv
http://www.iesb.net/video/serenitypanel8.wmv

Joss and Morena interviewed after the presentation:

http://www.iesb.net/video/josswhedonwwint.wmv

[Bandoman]

Wow, thanks Barry.

Edit: Looks like his account has been suspended.

[Jackskeleton]

You hot link it to many sites and that bandwidth rapage happens. Whoever got it may want to put it up on Yousendit.com

[pilot]

links are alive again to download.

[Jackskeleton]

very cool. The whole panel really does have a lot more weight when watched over reading. Highly recommend folks get it and watch it. Filled with comedy gold.

[RaraFemina]

Since it's a new Serenity thread I have to say what I said in the last one....I CAN'T WAIT TO SEE THIS!!!!

[Jackskeleton]

Gizmodvd needs to step up in here and tell us all how cool it was again.

[Goldberg74]

Originally Posted by Jackskeleton

I sure hope they pick another font for the main title of the poster.

... but I'll go see the movie anyways.

[Barry Woodward]

From Zap2it:

Whedon To Feature Fans On Serenity DVD

A camera crew recording Joss Whedon's activities on Sunday (March 20) at Wizard World Los Angeles surprised many by turning its lens on the fans themselves.

Curious about the unusual turn of events, Zap2it.com accosted the trio of men, who revealed that they were taping footage for a piece on Whedon's fans, which will be edited together as a bonus feature for the DVD release of "Serenity."

The upcoming sci-fi film is based on the writer-director's series "Firefly," which lasted only 11 episodes before FOX pulled the plug. The fans' outcry caught the attention of Universal, which placed its faith in a silver-screen version of Whedon's unique space western.

"This is a movie that got made based on a canceled TV show," says writer-producer Adam Hauck, taking a break from interviewing fans. "That doesn't happen unless you've got a lot of very devoted fans. This [DVD feature] is a big deal to Joss -- kind of a tribute to the fans."

The feelings of admiration, gratitude and devotion are mutual. Hundreds of Whedon enthusiasts arrived early at the Long Beach Convention Center, some rising with the sun, to score the highly coveted passes that would allow them to attend the afternoon's signing.

Clutching posters, DVDs, comic books and other Whedon paraphernalia, the fans queued for two hours for a chance to have their items signed and to exchange a few words with the man himself. Those possessing more than the two-item maximum scrambled to befriend their fellow devotees, hoping to have their surplus taken on by their newfound pal.

Following the signing, Hauck, a cameraman and a boom mike operator approached fans to conduct short interviews about their fondness for the creator of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Angel."

"There's no corollary for the kind of fan support that Joss seems to gather around him," says Hauck, who questioned fans of various shapes and sizes, including: a woman whom Whedon helped nab a role as one of his extras and someone who wore a T-shirt emblazoned with the "Blue Sun" logo, the symbol of the corporate entity featured in "Firefly."

Hauck, the writer-producer of the popular film festival documentary "Homecoming," has written and produced a number of DVDs for Universal, including "Seabiscuit," "The Cat in the Hat" and "The Chronicles of Riddick." He admitted to being a "Firefly" fan himself after watching the series on TiVo, but couldn't share more about the rest of Whedon's vision for the "Serenity" DVD.

"You'll have to speak to Joss about that," he says.

Set 500 years in the future, "Serenity" centers on the crew of a cargo ship that's plunged into a battle between two powerful enemies when they take on a couple of refugees. "Serenity" whizzes into theaters nationwide beginning Friday, Sept. 30.

Source

[reverie]

The "fans on DVD" thing, I hate to say, sounds very dull. It could just be me though, and I realize I'm typing on information that could easily just be a tiny part of something.. so really, I guess I'm just wasting time. Here's hoping for a loaded four disc "shiny" edition DVD set (yeah, right)!

[Jackskeleton]

Got to see it tonight. (Thanks Sean) I have to say... Ouch. It was good and it was also sad. Best part of it was Joss was sitting about 5 feet away. No one really noticed it was him minus two or three people since the screening wasn't marked as serenity, but was tagged as "A Sci Fi film from a major studio set to release later this year". Best part of it was that after the showing while shuffling out, he was outside. So I got to ask him some quick questions before name dropping someone who knows him from work.

Spoiler material questions.

Spoiler:

friend of mine with me asked him why he decided to kill wash and brook and he simply said that it had to be done for that emotional aspect. He wanted to tell his story and there is no security of getting a sequel out so for that level he had to be up and the risk needed to be greater with no one really safe.

this one's not so spoiler filled.

I asked him why Ron Glass wasn't in the film much and he replied that there were 9 characters and they really needed to cut back on one to make sure that it could fit the time constraint of the two hours and get everyone fleshed out some.

thanked him and shook his hand. Friend asked him for his autograph and I had a pen, so got another one to toss in the pile


Here's the paper they had us fill out

[Barry Woodward]

What was the audiences reaction to the film? What parts of the film worked for you and what parts didn't? How finished were the effects? Was there any original score in place? Most importantly, you've got to supply us with spoilers and lots of them. I'm talking full summary, dialogue you remember, etc. I've been able to gleam some info from reading the various test screening reviews but the majority of people are reluctant to give anything away.

FYI: I've heard the latest cut, is about 15 minutes shorter than the original test screen cut.

Originally posted by Jewel Staite:

March 22nd, 2005

I'm trying to do this once a month, religiously and regardless of how busy I am. And since I'm, like, not busy at all right now, I figured it was time to spew some more pointless nonsense. Yipeeee!

Just got back from Wizard World in LA. Such a tease.... I was only in town two days and had no time to visit my favorite restaurants, coffee shops, shoe stores, clubs, etc. I didn't even feel like I was really in LA at all until I experienced the rush hour traffic on the 10 heading to the airport on my way home. Something I definitely don't miss. Anyway, a good time was had by all, as usual. Got to see some cool little Mal-and-Jayne action figures (and even got to see them kiss), some sketches of what some of our characters are going to look like all comic-booked out (cooooool), and got to see a clip with a few added special effects from the movie. My what's-Serenity-going-to-look-like-once-it's-done cravings are somewhat curbed... for the moment.

I know I've said this before, but let me shove it down your throat again, cuz I can. I am absolutely FLOORED at how much support we have from our fans. I just found out that there's actually a Vancouver Firefly meet up group... it's just too tempting not to find out where they're meeting next. What do they talk about at these meetup groups, I wonder? What goes on? Is there drinking?

What else is new? Um, not much. I'm feeling very domestic lately. I'm cooking a lot, but that's not new. Just bought my fourth pair of shoes in one month, which is disgusting. They only had one size left, a half size smaller than what I really am, but I'm too ashamed to say anything about it and have continuously paraded around the house, limping around in them, insisting that they have to be "stretched out, that's all". What else? OH and I've been playing Pac-Man. Yes, life is truly exciting.

It's so funny because whenever I'm working, I'm dying for vacation time or time to just goof off and do whatever... and when I'm not working, I'm antsy and feeling guilty because I'm doing nothing. I've actually started going to the gym, which isn't right, so it's clear that I have way too much time on my hands. Enjoy it while it lasts, though, right?

I'm singing at a friend's show in a couple of weeks, at a bar here in town called the Oasis. Just a couple of songs, as a favor, really. He's a "real singer" so I might regret this, but who cares? Something to do, and my husband's emceeing it, so yet another excuse for me to participate. It'll be fun. Hey, you Vancouver meetup people, come to my friend's show! It's on April 3.

That's the latest.

Jewel

[Jackskeleton]

I wrote down my test sheet quickly because.. well I'm pretty quick with those now a days and want to get out. But the general talk I overheard from folks coming out was a mix bag. Some saying that it was good while there was a big enough number saying they should have stayed home. Though in defense, a lot of those same folks were walking into the test screening expecting it to be F4 or Star wars for some unknown reason.

I really think that the set up and character introduction was top notch and anyone who hasn't seen the film can easily walk in blindly and still get the full effect of each character.

The VFX shots were still pretty rough in some spots. I hate to imagine how it must have looked like when Gizmo saw the test screening last month or so or how the first wave of test screenings late last year must have seen it because this one, while a bit more polished, was still very rough in some spots

I would say that the reason folks are reluctant to give out info was because of the details in the story. When shooting the shit with joss, I told him I understood why he went the route that he did, but that I can see that some fans might not like the road taken. All he said was "Well, don't tell anyone." It really is pretty dark and typical joss ending (i.e. think buffy and more importantly angel) The score was done to some degree, but remember, it's someone else scoring that isn't from the show.

It really does have a good book end introduction and ending when senerity comes on screen. Mal has a lot of Mal style onliners. Most noteable one liners that I can think of is the opening shot of the ship coming into a planets atmosphere and the ship is having a bumpy time coming down. Mal jumps on the intercome and tells the crew that they are in for some turbulance and then possible explosion. He walks the ship and comes across Jayne who tells him that he doesn't want to explode today.

It does carry the same Joss-ism dialouge that made the tv show good over to film. I enjoyed it a great deal regardless of what steps the film took.

[Jackskeleton]

Here's the set up for the film:


River has a secret in her mind that she got from the alliance when they looked at her when she was a test subject with the ability of being a reader. So now the alliance wants to keep that secret silent at any means possible. The crew is put into a bad position because of this and Mal has to choose what sort of "family" he will keep as his crew.

[Barry Woodward]

Very cool. Not to sound ungrateful or greedy but there's no need to hint around so much. You've never been the type to hold back what you think. Just use the spoiler tags and give it to us hardcore. That is unless you're morally against spoilers or signed a confidentiality agreement.

[Jackskeleton]

Ok, here's my extremely unheld back spoilered full on review of the film. Contains a lot of spoilers.

Spoiler:

The filmed opens up with a shot of a young River in school questioning what others tell her to do and then snaps to her days as an experiment. We see Simon come in and rescue her and as they escape the image freezes to what appears to be a Danger Room style hologram projector. The person viewing this file footage is none other than the main villain of the film, the ultimate badass assasin. Someone from the alliance that they call when shit goes down and it is far above classified. We get a treat of him being extra badass when the scientist that was on duty during the escape comes in and tells him he's not suppose to be watching that. Only to get told that the scientist sin is being vain. Allowing high ranked alliance members in with River. Since she is a reader and all and who knows what sort of secrets she has hidden in her head. Bad ass classy assassin makes short change of the security and then does a sort of nerve pinch on the scientist making him fall straight onto badass assasin's blade.

This allows us to get introduced with the enemy and gives us some insight into Rivers past and how Simon exactly got her out in detail. We then are kicked to Serenity coming into the atmospher very hot and falling apart. I especially liked the aspect of a piece flying off of the ship because it is touched on again at the end. This shot establishes the characters of the ship that we have known, but are totally new for folks walking in fresh. First off we have Mal and Wash with typical Mal humor and delivery about the shipping falling apart. Mal then does his round of the ships other crew. Passing up Jayne, as he is getting ready for the bank hiest. He has a jayne moment with his guns and Mal goes on to the next crew member working his way all the way down to Kaylee who is working in the engine room like always and over to simon. The only two missing are Shepard and Inara. Who for those up to speed with the show, would know were off the ship by that point.

The way Joss handled that aspect of introducing the characters to the screen for both those new to the franchise and he didn't dumb it down to much for those long term fans. I really do give him a lot of credit for walking that fine line and doing a great job at playing to both sides with this.

The events lead up to Mal taking River on the hiest with them because of her talents with Simon protesting the action. The hiest goes pretty well and is pretty much given the feel from any of the typical situations of the episodes till Reavers show up. The visual FX shot wasn't complete as reavers came sliding down and it mentioned that their were going to be dead bodies strapped to the outside of the ships. Our group gets out of there as quickly as possible while making a quick attempt to make sure the folks are safe. One of the villagers ask for help and Mal turns him away, only to get attacked by reavers. Mal puts him out of his misery and then the big chase occurs between a half finished FX shot of a reaver ship and the mule ship that the crew is escaping from. Jayne gets hurt by a spear to the leg in the shot and, for the fx that were done, it looked and felt pretty intense of a chase with plenty of back and forth cross fire.

Pretty good service to highlight what the characters do and also set up that whole "Western in space" aspect that made the show what it was. Conflict between Simon and Mal leads to Simon wanting to be let off the ship with River in fear of her safety, Though River makes comments how the ship isn't safe with them.

They go to a Blade Runner looking port city and make their delivery of a percentage of the job to the twins, exactly what it sounds like. Identical twins who seem to provide them info on their last job. All the while, Simon and River walk on their own through the city as they are on their own now. At this point in time, the crew, especially kaylee expresses their concern with letting Simon and River be on their own. Mal questions what kind of crew he is leading and the weight of leaving the guy to die from the hiest after zoe brings up how they wouldn't have left anyone behind to die during the war.

The set up of Mal's mentality of togetherness is being laid out through these parts of the film. Pretty good set up so far and even better when during the meeting with the twins, River walks through the bar and gets a signal through tv air waves in the form of some octopus strange commercial. The signal triggers River to become an ultimate asskicking weapon creating a bar fight from hell taking out everyone till Simon gives the safety word. This was something the alliance released on the air waves to see where River is at.

Mal takes them back to the ship before any alliance picks up wind of the situation and they contact Mr. Universe to see if the fight made the news in any way. They find out that the feed was only watched by someone else. who has their scent now. At this point they bring back Inara in the form of a trap set up by The Assasin to get the crew to bring River to him....

I'm a bit tired right now, so I'll pick this up tomorrow.

[Barry Woodward]

Now that's what I'm talkin' about! That's the most detailed summary on the net, as far as I've seen. Also, consider sending in a review to Ain't It Cool News.


From Backstage:

'Off Broadway' Baby



Rebecca Moscowitz, a struggling young actor, stands onstage, reciting a carefully memorized monologue. As she goes through her audition, voices talk over her, evaluating her suitability for the part. After a few lines, she is interrupted: "Excuse me, Miss, how tall are you?" About 5-foot-8, she responds, puzzled. "Really? Hmmm. Okay, all right, thank you." As Rebecca slinks offstage, one of the unseen auditioners mutters, "She just looks too damn tall."

This is a scene from writer-director Dan Kay's movie Way Off Broadway, a festival favorite focusing on five fresh-out-of-college artists and their struggles in New York City. It's also a scenario that's painfully familiar to aspiring actors everywhere. Morena Baccarin, the twentysomething actor who portrays Rebecca, can sympathize as well as anyone else. "[I've experienced] the usual stuff that I'm sure happens to a lot of people, which is, you prepare, like, 15 pages overnight, and then they say, 'We're only reading the first two pages,'" she says, laughing. "[I have] the usual horror stories of how difficult it is to audition in this town. I had to do a fake striptease once. That was pretty awful."

Though she knows firsthand about the struggles of the working actor, Brazilian-born Baccarin has also had a few enviable experiences in her career thus far. She landed an agent while she was still at Juilliard, and she booked the part in Way Off Broadway shortly before graduation. "Morena walked into the room pretty early on in the audition process, and she blew us away," says Kay. "When she left, one of the producers turned to me and said, 'That girl's going to be a star.' I said, 'Without question.'"

Baccarin eventually decided to take the plunge and move to L.A. "I was understudying a lot of theatre--I understudied Natalie Portman in The Seagull in [Central Park]...and I did regional theatre in Minneapolis, but I couldn't get any work in theatre in New York City," she says. "So I thought, 'Well, I need to be on a TV show. I need to first make a living doing what I love to do, and maybe I can get in that way.' I thought, 'Well, I hate L.A., I'm a total New Yorker, [but] it's time for me to face my fears and try something new.'"

It looks like that was the right move. A few days after landing in Los Angeles, Baccarin was cast as serene space courtesan Inara in Joss Whedon's innovative sci-fi western series, Firefly. "My agent said, 'There's something coming in for you this afternoon. It has to be really quick because they've already started shooting. You have to go in for it this afternoon. Here's the sides,'" she remembers. "I contemplated saying no, because I hate doing that. I want to always show my best work, but when I went in there, it just all worked out great. I literally got the job the next day, went down to the set, and started working, like, two days later. It was pretty crazy."

The craziness didn't end there. Despite strong fan support and positive critical buzz, the Fox show was cancelled before it finished its first season. For TV newbie Baccarin, this was a tough experience. "It was my first TV show, so I got extremely attached to it and to the people who were working on it," she says. "I was really hurt and really sad [when it was cancelled]. We all bonded so quickly. I kind of didn't know what to make of it. At a certain point, I think, you harden yourself to the realities of the business. I thought, 'Okay, it's cancelled, I'm going to move on now. I've been hurt by this, I'm not going to let it happen again.'"

Whedon, however, refused to let the project die. In September, Universal will release Serenity, a Firefly feature film that reunites the entire cast. "Joss kept saying, 'This is not over. We're gonna do something,'" remembers Baccarin. "When they called me up and said, 'Do you want to do a movie of Firefly?' I was, like, 'Excuse me?' I couldn't believe it, and I could not have been happier. Shooting the movie was just as much fun as shooting the TV show, if not more, because we had a bigger budget."

These days Baccarin doesn't have a problem getting auditions, but landing the job is still a challenge. And, like "too tall" Rebecca, she gets her share of dubious-sounding excuses. "The lamest excuse that I get incessantly is, 'Oh, we're not going ethnic with that role,' so I can't go in for it or I can't get the part, which is really stupid, because, in today's world, people look different," she says. "And, as you can tell, I'm pretty American. I don't have an accent or anything."

Still, Baccarin is pleased, for the most part, by the way L.A. is treating her so far. "I feel like I go in on a lot of things that I want to be going in for," she says. "I can't complain. I'm making a living out of what I do, which is really rare for a lot of actors. The hard part is staying confident and staying with it."

Source

[GizmoDVD]

Originally Posted by Jackskeleton

Gizmodvd needs to step up in here and tell us all how cool it was again.

Ok, it fucking ROCKED! Care for more? Actually, they screened Serenity again in my area, but I was away on vacation and missed it :-( . One of my old employees went and saw it, with only seeing the pilot episode a year back when we did inventory in my store, and LOVED the movie. So maybe its a good sign?

[Jackskeleton]

I really can't imagine how rough the one you saw was since the fx's on the one I saw were stilly pretty bad in some spots.